Trees, often very large. Leaves coriaceous, scattered or clustered at the end of branches, petiolate; stipule small or large, usually caducous. Inflorescence axillary, fascicled. Flowers long stalked. Sepals 4, biseriate, outer sepals valvate, inner imbricate. Corolla usually (5-) 8 (-18)-lobed, 1-few-seriate, often pubescent between the stamens, contorted in bud, tube campanulate. Stamens at least twice as many as the corolla lobes, 15-20 (-40), in 1-3 whorls, sessile, subsessile or with filaments inserted in the corolla throat, anthers lanceolate, generally with a mucronate or excurrent connective. Ovary usually hairy, 8-21-celled with 1 ovule in each cell; style linear, persistent. Fruit a berry, ovoid or oblong-ellipsoid, 1 (-4)-seeded. Seeds with narrow scar, exalbuminous.

A genus with 75 species, distributed in Malaysia and South-East Asia. Madhuca is mainly a West Malaysian genus with its centre in Borneo and the Malay Peninsula. In Pakistan it is represented by the following cultivated species.